HUNDREDS of singers are needed to take part in a unique project that will culminate in performances as part of the London 2012 Cultural Olympiad.

Coastal Voices will involve four new commissions, hundreds of singers and concerts in Dorset, Devon and London.

It will culminate in a performance at the Live Site on Weymouth Beach on July 27, 2012 in advance of the opening ceremony of the London Olympic Games being broadcast.

Anyone who sings in school or a community choir, in a choral society or just in the bath is being urged to get involved.

Led by Lighthouse, Poole’s Centre for the Arts and international music producers Serious, the Coastal Voices project is looking to recruit hundreds of singers to join in professional workshops and rehearsals in locations up and down the Jurassic Coast from September 2011.

Four vocal ‘hubs’ set-up in Weymouth, West Dorset, Poole and East Devon and communities right across the coastal region will be unified ‘through voice and place’.

A total of 25 people from Dorset will perform in Greenwich, London on July 21 and 22, 2012, with other performances in Poole and Weymouth.

As part of the Cultural Olympiad, Coastal Voices will link to Australia and is connected by World Heritage sites and also by the commonality of Sydney and Poole having the two largest natural harbours in the world.

Working with composers from rock, jazz and contemporary music, the commissions will range from new arrangements of cult classics by Nick Cave and B sharp’s stories of Lyme Regis from John K Miles and Billy Bragg, to John Surman’s Brazilian infused Wind Samba and Marc Yeats’ new geological sound world.

Each offers choirs the chance to explore new music and the magnificent World Heritage Site coastline which will form the backdrop to the Olympic sailing and windsurfing events in 2012.

Elspeth McBain, chief executive, Lighthouse Poole said: “I’m particularly excited about the way this project can link communities, all generations, bring local talent of all abilities and guest artists together to sing new and wonderful work, created by international composers and inspired by London 2012 and the Jurrasic Coastline of Dorset and Devon.

“The burgeoning strength of the choral community in this region seems unlike any other in the UK, and I’m delighted we can offer our choirs this international platform, as well as providing a body of new work created for the region of Poole and Dorset as a lasting Olympic legacy.”

Coastal Voices want as many people as possible to have a chance of taking part in the project.

Any interested singers can contact Kate Burrough, project manager, by emailing info@coastalvoices.co.uk More information on the project can be found online at coastalvoices.co.uk